1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and to a device for generating a reaction system, particularly a spatially limited convective reaction system, between a reaction agent and a molten bath, whereby the reaction agent is applied in a free stream to the surface of the molten bath.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A method of the above general type is disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 3,902,985, which is fully incorporated herein by this reference. U.S. Pat. No. 3,902,895 relates to a method for the separation of foreign elements from a molten metal bath, particularly copper, wherein reaction gases in the form of a highly-concentrated, high-energy stream are blown nearly perpendicularly into the surface of the bath with such a force that the melt beneath the blow impression is excited to a toroidal rotation, whereby a spatially limited reaction unit with a defined material junction is generated.
The known method, whereby reaction gases were brought into contact with a molten bath under specific conditions, led to considerable improvements in comparison to the state of the art at the time of that invention. In particular, this first allowed a continuous refining method by strictly reproducible and controllable, defined substance transmutations, whereby optimum results were achieved at an economic expense.
However, a loss of reaction agent cannot be avoided in such a reaction system in which the reaction medium is blown onto the molten bath in the gaseous phase and in a free stream. This is true, in particular, because the gas is deflected in the stagnation point of the stream, and a rising layer stream of compressed gas prevents the contact of a partial stream of the gas with the molten bath. This part of the reaction gas in the partial stream is, therefore, lost for the direct mass transfer between the gas and the molten bath.